Post Date: June 20, 2005
Harvard Law School’s Berkman Center for Internet & Society — the first research center for cyberlaw — and the Oxford Internet Institute — the world’s first multidisciplinary Internet research center — today announced a new research and teaching collaboration.
Beginning in the 2005-06 academic year, students and fellows from each institution will be able to work with each other on a number of common research and teaching endeavors. The centers will coordinate joint research projects, events, fellowships, and summer internships. Collaboration will include practical experiments in the use of Internet technologies for teaching and research.
This partnership builds on a series of growing, informal links between the two centers, including a summer doctoral program. The collaboration is anchored by the election of Assistant Professor Jonathan Zittrain to Oxford’s Chair in Internet Governance and Regulation. Zittrain will be the inaugural holder of the professorship, and will also become the Jack N. and Lillian R. Berkman Visiting Professor for Entrepreneurial Legal Studies at Harvard Law School. Zittrain helped establish the Berkman Center in 1996-97, and has led many of its initiatives, including ongoing research projects on internet filtering and open source software.
“We are honored to be joining the Oxford Internet Institute in a more formal partnership as we seek to learn more about the Internet as a global phenomenon,” said John Palfrey, Executive Director of the Berkman Center. “Through Professor Zittrain’s leadership at both institutions next year, we are poised to deepen our common understanding of the development of the Internet and what it means for societies around the world.”
In the coming months, more information about the partnership will be available on the websites for the Berkman Center and Oxford Internet Institute.